She Is Sorry and Lives America Inward
She brooded father demonstration
of adulthood the Tic Tac emulation—
new tax law on the Kaw reservations
their mouths duct-taped like communication.
Gridlock hungry linkup Deco girl,
averse not earthward saving Husserl
a stray rescue or two Victorian hollyhocks
or pendant c. 1910 more than fan or foreign film.
This seduction she wears like a tiara
her guilt antique, and generationed before.
Permed and in penitent taxi driver costume she piles
fresh flowers, pillows to hold the body heat of cats.
In this season, north wind waters like a yacht
with windows shut tight against oceans
any oceans not oceans out of city.
Clouding up on the inside she smokes a cigarette,
in the aftermath the vehicle deteriorates,
the language stirs what is made—a hanged man
as upside-down, made, mannered, as refund swingshift,
a clock moves linear not unlike non-narrative,
infection organizes matchbox, if factory fictions this way.
previously published in Black Bread #4 (1994)
Copyright © Valerie Fox 2007 - 2008